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Thaddeus Young is a good player, and almost definitely the best power forward we have on the team at the moment, but the team has lots of depth in the front court, could use assets for the future more than win-now players, and the jury is still out on whether the team will be winning anything at all this year anyways. So what should the Pacers do with Thad?

Third choice has too much logic compared to other two.

A combination of the 1st and 3rd one.

The Pacers should definitely be looking to trade him immediately. In other scenarios, I wouldn't care as much, but Sabonis has shown enough promise that I really wanna see him starting at the 4 next to Turner now.

That said, while we should be fielding offers for him immediately, we shouldn't take the first offer we get. We should find the best offer out there - but I'd prefer we did it sooner rather than waiting until the trade deadline.

Wait and see is best. We don't want to dump him just to dump him.

Thad is interesting because he is one of those rare players pretty much exactly worth the money he's getting. That means that he is just as much worth to us being on the team as a starting vet as he is walking away and clearing our books of his salary.

We should wait to get good value for him because who knows how the playoff race shakes out and which contending team wants to cash in young assets for a decidedly plus player. Thad is a top-15 PF in the league. Go ahead. I'll wait for you to name more than 14 starting PFs better than him.

Deadline is probably the best bet to get the most return, I think getting a mid-late first round pick is the best case scenario and some team that has a key injury or just needs a push and is thin at PF might pull the trigger. The current situation is fine as it allows Leaf to come along slowly, though I really do want to see Sabonis starting at PF by the end of the season.

Miller4ever wrote: Thad is a top-15 PF in the league. Go ahead. I'll wait for you to name more than 14 starting PFs better than him.

Unfortunately, that is not the only thing that matters in this situation. How many of the teams competing in the playoffs need a power forward? Even if Thaddeus is a top 15 PF in the NBA, most of the teams who would look to acquire a guy like that already have one. There are definitely some options out there, but it very much limits the possibilities.

I say trade him now. I would call teams while they believe they have a shot, considering its early. Or a team like Phoenix, to gauge if bledsoe can be had for a package of Cojo, young and a 2nd. We don't really need Bledsoe, but accumulating assets is always smart.

Collison/ bledsoe
Oladipo/ Stephenson
Bogdanovic / GR3
Sabonis / Leaf
Turner / Sabonis / Jefferson

I would have to think Bledsoe would start over Collison. I'm not sure those are the type of guys Phoenix would be looking to get for him over younger pieces or first rounders though.

boomershadow wrote:I would have to think Bledsoe would start over Collison. I'm not sure those are the type of guys Phoenix would be looking to get for him over younger pieces or first rounders though.

If Collison was starting over Bledsoe, something has gone completely out of whack.

But, supposedly the Suns have asked the Knicks about Frank Ntilikina and the Cavs about the Nets first round pick in return for Bledsoe.... so we're out of the sweepstakes before we could even get in

Well, no one will ever mistake me for being the biggest Thad Young fan. That being said, I still think his actual on-court value far-and-away exceeds his trade value, therefore my vote was option #2. Only move him if we're out of playoff contention in February, which is going to be hard to do in the eastern conference.

All that said, Sabonis needs to start and Young should be the top option of the bench, similar to his early Philly days when the Sixers were a middle-of-the-pack playoff team. Then shop his expiring contract during the summer and see what offers are out there, assuming he exercises his player option.

xxSnEaKyPxx wrote:

Miller4ever wrote: Thad is a top-15 PF in the league. Go ahead. I'll wait for you to name more than 14 starting PFs better than him.

Unfortunately, that is not the only thing that matters in this situation. How many of the teams competing in the playoffs need a power forward? Even if Thaddeus is a top 15 PF in the NBA, most of the teams who would look to acquire a guy like that already have one. There are definitely some options out there, but it very much limits the possibilities.

That was my argument for waiting and seeing. Let's say Jae Crowder gets injured, or Ryan Anderson (which is very possible). Hanging on to him is good because he helps make the team watchable without adding too many wins, and his salary coming off the books if he doesn't pick up his option or his status as a high-value expiring next season if he does pick up the option makes him a win-win-win asset for us right now.

Miller4ever wrote:

xxSnEaKyPxx wrote:

Miller4ever wrote: Thad is a top-15 PF in the league. Go ahead. I'll wait for you to name more than 14 starting PFs better than him.

Unfortunately, that is not the only thing that matters in this situation. How many of the teams competing in the playoffs need a power forward? Even if Thaddeus is a top 15 PF in the NBA, most of the teams who would look to acquire a guy like that already have one. There are definitely some options out there, but it very much limits the possibilities.

That was my argument for waiting and seeing. Let's say Jae Crowder gets injured, or Ryan Anderson (which is very possible). Hanging on to him is good because he helps make the team watchable without adding too many wins, and his salary coming off the books if he doesn't pick up his option or his status as a high-value expiring next season if he does pick up the option makes him a win-win-win asset for us right now.

If Anderson gets injured (and it's minor enough) we could trade for him and a solid asset or 2 in echange for Thad and Anderson's contract.


On topic, I agree with the wait and see consensus. The field will move over the next few months and we will get a clearer picture of who is interested and what Thad's value is to them. I don't mind Thad and think he's started the season pretty well, but if he wants to play playoffs and we can get a return, a move could be best for both parties.

SmashMouthRod wrote:I say trade him now. I would call teams while they believe they have a shot, considering its early. Or a team like Phoenix, to gauge if bledsoe can be had for a package of Cojo, young and a 2nd. We don't really need Bledsoe, but accumulating assets is always smart.

Collison/ bledsoe
Oladipo/ Stephenson
Bogdanovic / GR3
Sabonis / Leaf
Turner / Sabonis / Jefferson

If Bledsoe is had for a package like that Kevin Pritchard will be in jail for robbery. Suns are going to look for assets. CoJo and Thad if moved are going to go to playoff type teams.

Trade him...since trading Granger went so well for the locker room.

I know this team is different in makeup. But you have no idea what losing does to even the purest of locker rooms. Of course, if someone offers you a 1st round pick and the team is hovering around the lottery at midseason you consider it. We need vets in the locker room, but we need the right vets. Thad has been on losing teams and has never appeared to be a malcontent.

Major Cold wrote:Trade him...since trading Granger went so well for the locker room.

I know this team is different in makeup. But you have no idea what losing does to even the purest of locker rooms. Of course, if someone offers you a 1st round pick and the team is hovering around the lottery at midseason you consider it. We need vets in the locker room, but we need the right vets. Thad has been on losing teams and has never appeared to be a malcontent.

I mean these are not even remotely close to the same situations.

The Pacers were competing to win the East that year.

We are a team rebuilding right now.

If we decide as a rebuilding team to hold on to a near 30 year old Thad Young and let him walk for nothing instead of acquiring a young piece that could help us in the future, then our front office has no idea what they are doing.

xxSnEaKyPxx wrote:

Major Cold wrote:Trade him...since trading Granger went so well for the locker room.

I know this team is different in makeup. But you have no idea what losing does to even the purest of locker rooms. Of course, if someone offers you a 1st round pick and the team is hovering around the lottery at midseason you consider it. We need vets in the locker room, but we need the right vets. Thad has been on losing teams and has never appeared to be a malcontent.

I mean these are not even remotely close to the same situations.

The Pacers were competing to win the East that year.

We are a team rebuilding right now.

If we decide as a rebuilding team to hold on to a near 30 year old Thad Young and let him walk for nothing instead of acquiring a young piece that could help us in the future, then our front office has no idea what they are doing.

I think you are both right. The value of veteran presence is very underrated like what Major said. Especially when things are not going well. You gotta have someone that can point the young guys in the right direction. Some folks don't think about these aspects of a team. It is not NBA2K18 or fantasy basketball.

That being said if there comes along an offer for Thad that improves our team going forward we have to take it. Would be crazy not to. But, I do hope we would look to add a vet after we traded that either in that trade or as a FA. We are a very young team. Wilkins is good to have around. But then the young guys are looking to guys like Lance.

Pacers_Freak wrote:The value of veteran presence is very underrated

Who turned our team around in the 90's? Byron Scott. He was near the end of his career, but he showed a young Reggie Miller what it took to be professional.

xxSnEaKyPxx wrote:

Major Cold wrote:Trade him...since trading Granger went so well for the locker room.

I know this team is different in makeup. But you have no idea what losing does to even the purest of locker rooms. Of course, if someone offers you a 1st round pick and the team is hovering around the lottery at midseason you consider it. We need vets in the locker room, but we need the right vets. Thad has been on losing teams and has never appeared to be a malcontent.

I mean these are not even remotely close to the same situations.

The Pacers were competing to win the East that year.

We are a team rebuilding right now.

If we decide as a rebuilding team to hold on to a near 30 year old Thad Young and let him walk for nothing instead of acquiring a young piece that could help us in the future, then our front office has no idea what they are doing.

Do you want the young players to be comfortable with losing? Because vets push teams to not be content with losing. I am all for hope in young prospects and picks. But that alone does not nurture a winning culture.

Major Cold wrote:Do you want the young players to be comfortable with losing? Because vets push teams to not be content with losing. I am all for hope in young prospects and picks. But that alone does not nurture a winning culture.

We still have guys like Myles Turner who has a very good head on his shoulders and has claimed he wants to be a leader. We have Victor Oladipo that was on the Thunder last year. We have Cory Joseph who has been on the Spurs(won a Championship with them) and the Raptors who were in the ECF last year.

Trading Thaddeus Young(who has mostly always been on bad teams) does not doom us to having a losing culture. Letting him walk for nothing when we could have gotten an asset for our future, would show incompetence by our front office.

xxSnEaKyPxx wrote:Letting him walk for nothing when we could have gotten an asset for our future, would show incompetence by our front office.

there is an assumption there that we could trade him for an asset. now if you'd said, "letting him walk for nothing, IF we could have gotten an asset for our future," we'd be able to lock this thread and move on.

even then though, whether the front office would be incompetent would depend upon whether they had a viable plan to benefit from their decision not to take the best available offer. I think we all agree that the goal is to field the best team possible when our core players (Turner, Dipo, Sabonis, Leaf, etc.) are at their peak. How that goal will best be accomplished depends upon future events that we just can't accurately predict now.